Should factory farming be phased out within ten years?

In March 2024, bird flu turned up in American dairy cattle for the first time ever, and within weeks a Texas farmworker caught it from infected cows. That had never happened before: a flu virus jumping from birds to cows to a person, in that order. The CDC's own writeup calls it the first instance of likely mammal-to-human transmission for this virus. CDC Now picture where it happened. Not on a small family dairy. The outbreak ripped through industrial herds where thousands of genetically similar animals breathe the same air, because that is what a factory farm is: a casino floor for viral mutation, running 24 hours a day. Every epidemiologist will tell you pandemics come from crowded animals. We got a warning shot in 2024. A ten-year phaseout is not radical. Waiting for the mutation that spreads between people is.